Conditioning machine for cloths



Nov. 1, 1932.

E. WENZEL' CONDITIONING MACHINE FOR CLOTHS Filed My 11, 19.51

s Sheets-Shee t Nov 1,- 1932. E, WENZEL 1,885,396

CONDITIONING MACHINE FOR CLOTHS Filed May 11, 1951. 5 Sheets-Sheet 2 Nov. 1, 1932. E. WENZEL UONDITIONING MACHINE FOR CLOTHS Filed May 11. 1931 2%! 5 Sheets-Sheet 5 ure 1,

Patented Nov. 1, 1932 UNITED STATES EMIL wnivznnor AUE, eERMANY ssIeNoR'ro ERNsr snssnnn exrrnnensnrt- I sonArr, or AUE, GERMANY, A CORPORATION or GERMANY ooivnrrroivIns MAcnrNE roncrlorns Application filed may 11, 1931, Serial No. 536,625, and in Germany February 10, 1931.

The invention relates to chines for cloths.

The known suspension drying machines having a circulatingjendless rod chain from 5 which the cloth to be treated hangs in loops are made use of also in conditioningan'd shrinking cloth, a moist wrapper running through the loops together with the cloth and transmitting moisture to the latter by direct contact therewith and by evaporation of its moisture.

Now this moist wrapper, which according to the prevailing conditions has a length of up to 100 meters, constantly changes in its behavior both as to operative length and running direction, and consequently deviates from the running direction of the accomp anying cloth whereby an uneven effect is caused. Therefore a special operator must always be present who constantly has to adjust the wrapper by hand; Alsothe changing con'di-' tion of the wrapper easily causes the creasing of the cloth. r

The present invention has forits object to continually and automatically adjust the run of the wrapper. The object isobtained, according to the invention, by the wrapper, after leaving the conditioningmachine and previous to returning for being moistened again, being guided through a train of guide rollersone or more of which are supported in a manner so as to be displaced in order to correct the run of the wrapper,this'correction being made by means of edge feelers.

which Figure 1 shows the parts under consideration of a conditioning machine designed according to the invention,

Figure 1a is a partial plan view of Figconditioning ma- Figure ll) is an elevation of the fixed bear ing of guide roller 9, I Figure 2'shows an edge feeler with its controlling connections, and

Figure 3' shows the 'mechani' ing the'displacement ofthe guide rollers.

Figure 4 is an elevation of the parts under consideration of the second embodiment of the invention, I Figure 4a is an enlarged view of a part of Fig.4,- Figure 4b is a plan view of Fig. 4a, and Figure 5 is a detail of the structure illustrated in Figure 4, on an enlarged scale," 7

7 Referring firstto Figure 1, a denotes a'portion of the circulating endless rod 'chainyb denotes a water tank, and 0, cl are two squeezing rollers. Roller 0? takes up moisture from tank 5 andgives it 0E to the wrapper e which passes between the rollers c and d. The end less wrapper e is continuouslycirculated by means 'of the train of guide rollers f, g,h, 2'.

The cloth to be treated is'desi'g'nated by 70 and arrives on a guide roller Z from Where it is led to the rods a of the-endless chain a. At m is disposed an edge fee-ler an embodiment of which is diagrammatically illustrated in Figure 2. I v v In the embodiment of the machine as illustrated in Figures 1 and 1a the fixed guide roller 71 is mounted in bearings 25, which may be accuratelyset upon racks 26.- The movable guide roller 9' is adapted to rock horizonta'lly'about one of its journals. Thus one of the trunnions of guide roller 9 maybe spherical, to form part of a ball joint in fixed hearing 27, as seen at 27, 28 of Figures 1a and lb. Likewise the other trunnion 29 of theguide roller is formed as a ball joint which is mounted in double armed lever 0, which can be rocked in a vertical plane about its fulcrum n. This rockingmotion of lever 0 causes the rocking movement of guide roller 9 about the ball joint 27, 28, as shown in dotted lines in Figure 1a. This movement affects the run of the wrapper in the desired manner. The free end of lever 0 carries a curved rack 0 of sm for reversworm teeth in mesh with a worm 8 supported of a pulley z and belt 2 by an electric motor a. The latter is connected for operation automatically by the edge feeler, illustrated schematically in Figs. 1 and 1a at m.

The edge feeler illustrated, Figure 2, is formed by a bell crank lever 21 fulcrumed at u and consisting of electrically non-conducting material. It carries two opposite contact pieces a, c which may alternatively come into contact with two stationary contact pieces to, Q02 provided on an insulating carrler wa When the wrapper deviates for instance in the direction of arrow 00, a circuit is closed by the contact pieces '0 10 so that the motor 0 starts running and the double lever 0 is rocked through the intermediary of the worm drive 8, 0 in such a manner as to impart to guide roller 9 that inclined position which is necessary to re-adjust the cloth in the direction of arrow y, Figure 2. However, when the wrapper 6 deviates in the direction of arrow y, the feeler 0; follows the deviating edge, as its vertical arm is permanently urged toward the edge by the overweight of its horizontal arm. Consequently the contact pieces '0 and 4.0 touch each other whereby the motor is reversed.

The described electric controlling mechanism may be modified in so far as the electric motor may permanently run in one and the same direction and a reversing gear is interposed between the motor and pulley 2, as illustrated in Figure 8. In this case the wires 1, 2, 3, 4 coming from the edge feeler do not a lead directly to the motor to cause it to run in the one or other direction but the wires 1, 4 lead to an electromagnet 5 while the wires 2, 3 lead to a similar electromagnet 6. The common armature 7 of these two electromagnets is fulcrumed at 8 and carries an arm 9 which engages a coupling sleeve 10 shiftably splined on a shaft 11. On the latter is mounted loosely, but not shiftably, on each side of sleeve 10, a bevel wheel 12 and 13, respectively, each of which has rigid with it a companion coupling sleeve. Both these bevel wheels 12, 13 are in mesh with a third bevel Wheel 14 which has rigidly connected to it a spur wheel 7 or a pulley 15. Shaft 11 is driven by a pulley 16 or an intermediate gearing from the elec tric motor 1" which permanently runs in the same direction. The spur wheel or pulley transmits the rotary motion of bevel wheel 1& in any suitable manner to the shaft of T worm s, Figure 1. Upon wrapper e deviating in the direction of arrow at, the contact pieces '0 'w energize the electromagnet 6 by completing the circuit between the wires 2 and 8. Thereby the armature 7 is attracted on the right, so that the coupling sleeve 10 couples bevel wheel 13 with shaft 11. and bevel wheel 14 revolves in the one direction whereby the guide roller 9 is displaced correspondingly. Upon wrapper e de viating in the direction of arrow y, the circuit of electromagnet 5 is closed by the contact pieces 0 10 In this case bevel wheel 12 is coupled with shaft 10 and acts to actuate bevel wheel 14 in the opposite direction than previously so that also the guide roller 9 is displaced in the opposite direction.

In the embodiment illustrated in Figures 1 and 5 the structure of the mechanism is notably simplified in so far as the edge feeler is provided with a mercury switclnand the displacement of the guide roller 9 is effected by the motor r through the intermediary of a screw spindle. The edge feeler is formed by a bellcrank lever 18 fulcrumed at 17 so as to freely swing like a pendulum, against the lower arm of which abuts the edge of the wrapper e. The upper arm of lever 18 carries a. bent glass tube 19 which contains a contact strip 42 connected to the wire 3. The two ends of tube 19 enclose each a contact piece 10 and 4.0 respectively, which contact pieces are in connection with the wires 1 and 2 and are disposed at a certain distance from the contact strip 0 The tube 19 further con tains a drop of mercury denoted by 20.

With normal run of the wrapper e the edge feeler 18 is in the position illustrated in Figure 5. As soon as the wrapper deviates to the right from its normal direction, the edge feeler follows so that the glass tube 19 assumes a position which is inclined to the left. Consequently the mercury drop 20 glides also to the left and connects the contact strip '0 to the contact piece to whereby the motor a" is started in the one, for instance the left-hand direction of rotation. A worm21, Figure 4, fixed to the motor shaft is in mesh with a worm wheel 22 mounted on the screw spindle 23 which is set in rotation in this way, 2 1 denotes the movable bearing of the guide roller 9 which bearing engages the spindle 23 like a nut and is displaced when the latter revolves. Bearing 24 carries one of the trunnions of guide roller 9 as a ball joint, and by its movement causes a rocking motion of the guide roller about its fixed pivoted joint at the other end thereof, as shown in Fig. 1?). Thereby the desired oblique position of the roller 9 is obtained and the wrapper e is enforced to return to normal run. Upon the wrapper deviating to the left, the upper arm of the edge feeler 18 swings to the right so that the mercury drop 20 connects the contact strip 41 to contact piece to and the motor is started in right-hand direction. Consequently roller 9 is rocked in the opposite direction.

W hat is claimed is:

1. In a machine of the class described a wrapper, a moistening device and a system of guide rollers for said wrapper which sys- 111 tem is disposed in front of said moistening device in the running direction of the wrap per, means for adjusting the position of at least one of said guide rollers, a feeler adapted to be permanently in contact with an edge 1 i L of guide rollers for said wrapper which system is disposed in front of said moistening device in the running direction of the wrapper, at least one rockingly mounted lever supporting one journal of one of said guide rollers, a feeler adapted to be permanently in contact with an edge of said wrapper, an electric motor electric means co-o erable with said feeler and adapted to close the circuit of said motor, and means for rocking said lever by said motor in accordance with the motions of said feeler caused by a deviation of the wrapper. r I

3. In a machine of the class described a wrapper, a moistening device and a system of guide rollers for said wrapper which system is disposed in front of said moistening' device in the running directionof the wrapper, at least one rockingly mounted lever supporting one ournal of one of said guide rollers, a feeler adapted to be permanently in contact with an edge of said wrapper, an electric motor adapted to permanently run in one and the same direction, means co-operable with said motor for rocking said lever, a reversing gear co-operable with said leverrocking means, and electrical means co-operable with said feeler and adapted to actuate said reversing gear according to the motions of said feeler caused by a deviation of the wrapper.

4:. In a machine of the class described a wrapper, a moistening device and a system of guide rollers for said wrapper which sys-' tem is disposed in front of said moistening device in the running direction of the wrapper, means for adjusting'the position of at least one of said guide rollers comprising a feeler adapted to be permanently in contact with an edge of said Wrapper,an'electric motor, electric means co-operable with said feeler and adapted to close the circuit of said motor, and means for rocking said guide roller by said motor in accordance with the motions of said feeler caused by a deviation of the wrapper, said electric means comprising a mercury switch adapted to take part in the motions of said feeleri and to close the motor circuit in the one or other direction according to these motions.

5. In a machine of the class described a wrapper, a moistening device and a system 7 of guide rollers for said wrapper which system is disposed in front of said moistening device in the running direction of the wrapper, means for adjusting the position of at least one of saidguide rollers comprising a feeler adapted to be permanently in contact.

1': with an edge of said wrapper, an electric motor, electric means co-operable with said feeler and adapted to close the circuit of said motor, and means for rocking said guide rollerbysaid motor in accordance with the motions of said feeler caused by a deviation of the wrapper, said electric means comprising a mercuryswitch adapted to take part in the motions of said feeler and to close the motor circuit in the one or other direction according to these motions, said adjusting means further comprising a screw spindle adapted to be turned by saidmotor and'to displace one of the bearings of said guide roller so as to adjust the latter.

' The foregoing specification signed at Berlin, Germany, this 28th day of April, 1931.

' f EMIL WENZEL. 

